Resumo

MANSILLA, H. C. F. Reflections about the sense of history: between doctrinaire optimism and relativist pessimism. RF [online]. 2008, vol.26, n.59, pp.23-41. ISSN 0798-1171.

The text displays the complexity of the discussion about the sense and the direction of history, and above all the great difficulty of endowing any sense to historical development in the present world. The article reconstructs briefly the pessimist position of the Frankfurt School, which represents a response to the conventional optimism of liberalism and marxism, conceived from a critique of the results due to technology and in view of today’s ecological problems. Finally the essay sketches the moderate scepticism of Karl Löwith as an acceptable compromise.

Palavras-chave : Meaning of history; School of Frankfurt; Philosophy of history; Karl Löwith.